Hotel Iris (11 page)

His feet were very clean—the nails neatly clipped, smelling faintly of soap—but they were old. The skin was pale and dry, and the heels were cracked. The nails on the little toes had been deformed by long years in hard leather shoes. Blue veins covered the tops of the feet, and the skin on the ankles was rough. The hair on his toes tickled my cheek. I licked them gently, hoping he might not notice, thrilled to be kissing him.

My moist lips caressed his weathered feet. Their color, dyed deeper than usual by the blood from my mouth, showed bright against his pale skin. I used only my lips. He sat on the edge of the bed, dressed in his suit, and I knelt on the floor, completely naked—and yet I had the sense that we were lost in each other’s arms. I kissed every inch, and as I
did, I felt that my mouth was lovely and clever, just as he had said.

… The boat is always full now. Unless you’re lucky, there is rarely a place to sit or even space to lean against the rail on deck. The tourists stand chatting, arms and legs bared to the sun. I try to be inconspicuous, finding a seat on one of the small benches next to the stairway. They’re not very popular because they are far from the windows and the best views of the sea. From time to time, some thoughtless traveler will leave his bag on one of the benches, but I toss it on the floor and take the seat.

They all seem to be at pains to avoid making eye contact with me, as if I weren’t even there. But that suits me well enough. I like to think about you on the boat. Not one person in that huge crowd knows what you did to my feet. Nor do they know that your left breast is slightly larger than your right, that you have a habit of touching your earlobe when you’re frightened, or that you have a dimple on your thigh. Or how lovely your pale face looks when you are on the verge of suffocating and want to ask for my help. I am the only one who knows everything about you. I pore over my secrets there on the boat, and savor their various pleasures.

How long will this heat continue? It’s the worst hot spell I have seen since moving to the island, and I am longing for winter. I imagine how nice it will be to walk through the cold, deserted town with you, once the summer has ended and the tourists have gone. Though one thing does bother me: the last boat of the day leaves an hour earlier in winter. I hope you don’t find me ridiculous for worrying about such things.

It happens every year that demand for my translation services drops off sharply in the summer. I haven’t had anything like a real job for some time now. But then translating from Russian has never been a profitable line of work. I suppose the number of people in this world who find themselves inconvenienced because they don’t understand Russian is really rather small.

Two or three years ago, I decided to try teaching Russian. I took some money from my savings, and I placed an advertisement in the newspaper. “Study Russian! Conversation, translation. Beginners welcome.” After the advertisement appeared, I waited every day for some response. But not one person answered the ad. Around the time the boat was due in, I would go out and stand on the porch. I listened for footsteps on the road down by the cove, but it was pointless. No one ever came climbing up the shell stairs. I had wasted my money.

But since I met you I have learned the real meaning of waiting. I have experienced the indescribable joy of waiting for you, there in front of the flower clock in the plaza, and I am inordinately happy, even before you appear to me.

I watch the people coming up from the shore road, staring at every girl with even the slightest resemblance to you, and then turning away when I realize my mistake. I perform this ritual over and over, never growing tired. I would gladly repeat my error a thousand times, two thousand times, if it means finding you, you who are wholly unique. Finally, I am at a loss to distinguish between the desire to see you as soon as possible and the pleasant prospect of waiting forever.

On the day we went to the circus, I had the great joy of waiting for three hours and twenty minutes. And still today, I find myself
dreaming of you as you came running up to me that day, perspiring profusely, with the setting sun shining at your back.

When the longing to see you becomes more than I can bear, I find solace in Marie. I translate line after line, writing them out in my notebook, and it calms me a bit to turn the pages and watch them fill up with her story.

Marie’s parents are opposed to her affair with the riding master and they shut her up in a lakeside villa and force her to marry a barrister. The riding master is conscripted into the military and sent far away. One day, Marie realizes that she is pregnant. When her husband finds out, he strips her naked, plunges her into the frigid lake, and then forces her to take a medicine to induce miscarriage.

It’s a splendid scene. When Marie has been stripped in the forest at the edge of the lake, her corset and garters and brassiere hang from the branches of the birch trees like exotic white flowers. She resists, but he seizes her by the hair and throws her into the lake. Her golden locks spread out on the surface, and the green water dyes her translucent skin. She does not know how to swim, so her arms and legs thrash uselessly and her mouth opens and closes in wild convulsions. The barrister forces the medicine down her throat, and when Marie gulps for air, she swallows the potion. …

I can picture every detail of Marie’s suffering, from the way the seaweed wraps about her ankles to the echoes of her cries among the birches. And then, in my mind, you, Mari, have taken her place.

Would you like to have lunch at my home next Tuesday? I will cook for you. Thanks to these long years of living alone, I have a degree of confidence in the kitchen. This is an excellent idea, I think,
and I feel certain that the meal will surprise you. I am already full of anticipation.

Come at eleven, or at noon, at any hour that suits you. I’ll wait for you at home. Please make your escape from the Iris. I implore you.

I hope you manage to avoid the worst of the heat. Take care of yourself.

Until we meet again, my dear Mari.

N I N E

It was certainly no ordinary lunch. I realized that things were different as soon as I walked in the door. There was a subtle change in the atmosphere of the house, and while it wasn’t unpleasant, I sensed that things could never go back to the way they had been.

A pot was boiling on the stove, and a striped blue cloth covered the table. Two hibiscus flowers were floating in a glass bowl, and dishes of food crowded every remaining space. A radio sat on the serving cart next to the drinks, playing a classical piece I did not know.

Where had he found the flowers? This was not a house for charming decorations. And the music? Other than the accordion tunes played by the boy in the plaza, we had never listened to music of any sort when we were together.

But I was most shocked to find that the translator was not alone.

“I’m so glad you could come,” he said. “It must have been hot on the boat. Please come in. Did you manage to find an excuse to get away? And can you spend the afternoon with us? Let me get you something cold to drink.” He was clearly in high spirits and couldn’t stop talking. He had taken off his suit jacket and loosened his tie, and he had even removed his cuff links and rolled up his sleeves. “But first I should introduce you—this is my nephew. He’ll be staying with me for a week.”

The young man stood and bowed to me without looking up.

“Hello,” I said, still quite confused. He sat down again and crossed his legs, settling deep into the couch. He was tall and thin, and his curly hair was long enough to cover his ears. He wore tight black pants and a white T-shirt, but around his neck was an oddly shaped pendant that was out of keeping with his simple clothes. It was the only thing remarkable about his appearance. It might have been a piece of art, or a charm or talisman.

A silence fell in the room. The translator’s nephew said nothing, ignoring the usual niceties. A piano solo began on the radio; the lid on the pot started to rattle.

“Aah,” said the translator, “I should have mentioned it right away. He was sick at one point, and ever since he has been unable to talk.”

“He can’t talk?”

“That’s right. But it’s nothing to worry about. He just won’t be able to answer you. … I’d better see to lunch. It will be ready soon, just have a seat.”

I felt ill at ease after he went into the kitchen. What did one do with a person who couldn’t talk? And besides, I was having difficulty accepting that someone other than the translator was sitting on the couch. Did this young man, with his slender hips and comfortably crossed legs, know what sorts of humiliating things had been done to me on that couch? The thought made me more and more uncomfortable.

He motioned for me to sit down, but he still avoided looking at me. When our eyes met, he looked away immediately, focusing on some random point, a scratch on the coffee table, a frayed patch on a cushion, or the tips of his fingers. Then he would keep his head down, staring, for some time, as though he had always wanted to examine that particular spot.

I sat across from him. We could hear the translator bustling about in the kitchen, and then the sound of the piano on the radio. Eventually, the woodwinds joined in.

Suddenly, a slip of paper was in my hand.
“It’s Chopin,”
the note said.
“His First Concerto. Do you know it?”

The pendant around his neck was in fact a thin, silver-plated case, like one you might use for cigarettes, except his held a small notepad. He had opened it, torn off a page, written the note with a tiny pen, and slipped it into my hand without a sound.

“I’ve never heard it before,” I said.

“It’s wonderful, don’t you think?”

“I do. I love it.” In fact, I was much more interested in our strange conversation, and I had hardly heard the music, but I was anxious to agree with him.

The click of the case as he popped it open; the sparkling white of the paper; the tip of the pen as it traced the characters; the casual way he passed me the note—it was almost like he had a voice.

Then he put away the pen and closed the lid of the case. I coughed quietly and drew a meaningless pattern on the carpet with the toe of my shoe. We fell silent again. The sound of the waves seemed closer than usual.

He stood up abruptly and went into the kitchen to adjust the radio. It was clearly a very old model, and though it was large and impressive, the sound was poor. The antenna was rusted and one of the knobs was missing, but eventually he managed to improve the reception.

Apparently, he had visited his uncle here more than once in the past, and he didn’t seem the least bit affected by the obsessive orderliness in the house. Whether he was opening a door or adjusting the radio, his manner was utterly natural, as if he had been doing it just that way for many years.

I, on the other hand, felt as though I was seeing the house for the first time and realizing that there were aspects of the translator’s life he’d kept hidden from me—to begin with, the fact that he owned a radio. He hadn’t kept it in the wardrobe, that much was certain. Perhaps he’d had it in the drawer of his desk? Or in the back of the dish cupboard? But
why had the radio—not to mention the flowers—suddenly appeared on the occasion of his nephew’s visit? Why for him and not for me? Questions came to me one after the other, like the sound of the surf.

“We’re ready at last! You must be famished. We’ll eat here in the kitchen.” The translator was oblivious to all my questions. “Would you show her where to sit?”

Those were the first words he had addressed to his nephew since I’d arrived, a simple, harmless request.

The nephew obediently pulled out my chair and signaled that I should be seated. I crumpled up the two notes he had given me and slipped them in my pocket.

When I first saw the dishes on the table, I had trouble believing that it was all for us to eat. I wondered, in fact, whether the display wasn’t simply another part of the translator’s new décor, like the hibiscus or the Chopin concerto.

There was no solid food. Everything was pulped or mashed or liquefied, as if for a baby just being weaned. There were no knives or forks at our places, only spoons. We didn’t need anything else.

But these soups and liquids were all beautiful colors. A deep green, slightly gritty mixture in the salad bowls that tasted of spinach and butter. Blood red in the soup bowls that I immediately identified as tomato, but with a complicated blend of spices. And on the large dinner plates, pools of bright yellow. It looked so much like paint that I hesitated before taking the first bite. My spoon made little eddies on the surface and released a puff of steam. I couldn’t imagine what it
was or how he’d made it. It smelled like a cross between damp leaves on the forest floor and washed-up seaweed.

“Do you come here every year?” I asked.

“No, not necessarily,” the translator replied for him. “I think it’s been three years since he was here. He’s quite busy, even during the summer holidays. He’s been doing study tours for his seminar, assisting one of his professors, and working on his thesis.”

“What is he studying?”

“Architecture. He’s an expert on the Gothic style. From the time he was a small child, he loved buildings. He used to make houses out of blocks for hours on end, but always the most unusual designs, the sort of thing no adult could imagine. And then at some point he started buying postcards of medieval churches, and he put together a remarkable collection—all churches, mind you. I doubt there are too many children in the world who show this kind of taste. With boys, it’s usually cars or baseball players or comic books. He was a strange child, to say the least.” As he finished speaking, the translator wiped his mouth with his napkin and then stirred the contents of his bowl with a spoon.